[MD] Capital Punishment

[Arlo J. Bensinger]

Mornin' Ham,

I've renamed the thread, hoping it will draw the attention and input of others.

[Ham wrote]
If you don't mind, I'm going to skip the messiah proposition because it
doesn't make sense.

[Arlo]
I was consolidating responses to you and Platt, so I did not expect you to
answer to the "can become messiahs" test of life or death.

[Arlo previously]
No one, lest of all me, has proposed that criminals of the sort you mention be
immune from punishment and incarceration. I am only suggesting that "murdering"
that prisoner is immoral, as was the act of the prisoner (murdering) in the
first place.

[Ham]
I think there's more than a semantic distinction between "murder" and
"execution".  The executioner is not a murderer; he is an agent of the state or
society which has passed this sentence on the offender.  The question is: Does
society have a moral right to take the life of a an impenitent or repeat
offender?  My answer is that the law of a particular society codifies the
morals of that society.  Therefore, where the execution of criminals is
empowered by the state, it is moral by definition.

[Arlo]
Yes, the difference between "executioner" and "murderer" is "societal backing".
But to me this is just "pc speak" to soften the idea of state-sanctioned
murder.

You restate the question, and so I'll repeat my reply. "No. Society does not
have the right to take the life of an impenitent or repeat offender, unless
that individual poses a serious threat to the existence of society. Otherwise,
incarceration and punishment (non-capital) must be used to protect the value of
life and even seemingly insignificant or impossible odds of DQ inspired
evolution."

[Ham]
A culture that sides with life (and freedom) also has a primary responsibility
to preserve and defend these values, even when it means
killing an enemy soldier, sacrificing its own warriors on the battlefield,
or taking the life of a hard core criminal.

[Arlo]
Your first two examples here are more in line with protecting society from
serious threats, in which case the MOQ sides with society "sacrificing a few
individuals" for its own interests.

The last, however, is fundamentally different (taking the life of a hard core
criminal). Unless you, or someone else, can prove to me that MY life was
threatened, or society itself was threatened, by the continued incarceration of
a hard core criminal, then taking that prisoners life is, according to the MOQ,
an immoral act.

[Ham]
This may be immoral by philosophical or religious standards, but it would be
naive to think that we could survive as a free nation without taking
appropriate action against an enemy that is morally committed to destroying us.

[Arlo]
Does anyone else find it ironic that the so-called "collectivist", who is often
rhetorically paired with Mao and Stalin, is the one condemning the murder of
individuals by society (except when under clear and serious danger), while the
self-professed "individualists" are the ones arguing in support of the right of
the state to take the lives of its citizens even when no clear or serious
threat exists??? Just wondering....

However, your statement that we could not exist as a "free nation" without
executing criminals ignores the fact that the rest of the western world exists
exactly as such.

[Ham]
As for the morality of euthenasia as applied to "brain-dead" patients, I think
this is a matter to be resolved by the patient's family and attending
physician.

[Arlo]
I disagree with your split. "Execution" and "euthenasia" are fundamentally
similar (when the prisoner poses no threat to society). Although one is done
for retribution and the other for convenience, the end result is the same. The
continuancy of an individual's life is determined by the state.

But, not to muddy the waters, you should know that I support an individual's
right to die, when such a decision is made under lucid conditions.

[Ham]
I don't know of any free civilized society that condones murder per se.
Where we have seen mass executions, as in the Nazi "extermination" camps and
"ethnic cleansing" campaigns of Africa and the Middle East, they have been
instituted by autocratic tyrants who are not acting on behalf of their
subjects.  There is no contradiction here, since murderers like Hitler and
Hussein do not represent the cultural values of their respective societies.

[Arlo]
I think Hitler perhaps more than Hussein was acting out deeply rooted "cultural"
prejudices. I certainly don't think that all Germans supported Hitler's
extermination, but the sheer magnitude of what he did was made possible by its
alignment with anti-semitic undercurrents throughout Germany (and Europe).

But, historically, then, what about the South pre-Civil War? This was a "free
society" that condoned the murder of non-white slaves (at least, the ones you
personally owned, or the ones that attempted to run away). Was the murder of
these slaves "moral" because it received societal justification?

But, since you draw the distinction, let me ask for clarity. Does "murder"
become "execution" when a certain percentage of the population supports it? Is
this the only test for the morality/immorality of taking a person's life?

[Arlo previously]
You talk about "social justice", but oddly, as I've pointed out to
Platt, the "most prisoner murdering" nations are (1) China, (2) Iran, (3)
Vietnam, (4) US, (5) Saudi Arabia and (6) Pakistan. Would you say that is a
list of countries concerned with "social justice"?

[Ham]
The concept of social justice, like morality, is relative to the particular
society.  Try to remember that we are not taking in absolute terms here.  I
certainly will concede that taking a human life, even by painless lethal
injection, is idealistically immoral.  I believe that the world community
should work to eliminate this ancient system of meting out justice, just as it
did the pagan "eye for an eye, arm for an arm" tradition.  But we are not there
yet, and it is foolhardy to pretend otherwise.

[Arlo]
The "eye for an eye" tradition was not pagan, it was/is occidental or middle
eastern. From Wikipedia, "The phrase "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth"
expresses a form of retributive justice also known as lex talionis (Latin, 'law
of retaliation'). It may have originated in ancient near-Eastern and Middle
Eastern law, such as Babylonian law."

And, I think this "eye for an eye" tradition is exactly what capital punishment
of prisoners IS! With Pirsig's caveat always in mind, it is really nothing more
than revenge and retribution that drives the support of capital crimes.

[Arlo]
Would you side with China, then, in saying it is "moral" for China to execute
political dissidents? These are prisoners that China feels are a very real and
serious danger to its social system.

[Ham]
I cannot speak for China's political paranoia.  But, again, you have singled out
a country which, while it has "Americanized" its marketing economy, is still
essentially a communist state rather than a free society.

[Arlo]
See above. Are you arguing that a certain percentage of popular support is
needed to turn "state sanctioned murder" into "state sanctioned execution"? And
again, I think there was a large segment of popular support in Germany for the
extermination of the Jews, just as there was large numbers in support of the
extermination of Native Americans, and lynchings in the south.

So I'm not sure what other difference you might mean when you (seemingly)
propose that America's "justifications for execution" are somehow superior to
China's, or Germany's, or even to our own historical past?

[Ham]
If you are asking if I think the US should invade China and put down its
government, my answer is no.  The institution of a free democracy is most
effectively done by the citizens of the nation in question.  The collapse of
the Soviet Union and recent events in Iraq should have taught us that freedom
is not easily mandated by the state.  I think we should always encourage
freedom movements in captive countries, however.

[Arlo]
Ham, we are in complete agreement. :-)

We can skip the "Flow" stuff, it was just a tangental suggestion.

Arlo